Columns

As the S.C. Policy Council has been compiling this year’s “Best and Worst of the General Assembly,” I couldn’t help noticing a recurring theme: economic development-related bills.
Some are overt, like one that would create two new grant programs and a grant fund to further integrate economic development into the state’s school system.
Others are not, such as the bill that offers a tax credit for purchasing S.C. produce. The credit is capped, which means not everyone who applies will get it.

After Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced Monday night that he lacked the votes to proceed on the latest plan to replace Obamacare, Sen. Lindsey Graham urged him to consider an alternative that Graham released last week with Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.). Here’s a statement Graham released about the Graham-Cassidy plan:

It’s time for a new approach to repealing and replacing Obamacare. I have worked with Sen. Bill Cassidy, a medical doctor, on this latest proposal.

All the way from the boardrooms of tech executives in Silicon Valley to the kindergarten class at Voyager Charter School in Charleston, the coding movement is sweeping the country.
So, who is behind the coding movement?

South Carolina, like every other state, is in the business of building roads. It’s a big business: Four of the top 10 vendors for the state last year were roads contractors, accounting for $175 million in spending alone.
And that doesn’t reckon the opportunity cost – all of the things that don’t get funded because roads do. I may say conservation, you may say law enforcement, but either way, there’s a magnified cost.

Editor’s note: Sen. Graham spoke Wednesday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It is considering the Taylor Force Act, a bill he introduced that would cut off U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority if it does not end its practice of paying monetary rewards to the families of terrorists who kill Americans and Israeli citizens. Taylor Force’s father, Stuart, of Kiawah Island, was at the hearing. Here are excerpts of Graham’s remarks.

The Declaration of Independence wasn’t about revolution.
Here’s what it says: “We hold these truths to be self-evident… that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men… that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government….”
We generally think of this in terms of an uprising, and certainly it entailed that for the founding fathers — but for them, it was about preserving their rights.

I would like to call attention to Brian Carnes’ guest column in Sunday’s paper entitled “Carnes objects to council snubs of Holt, Wilson.”
I agree with his statement: “We can only accomplish greatness by working together and by being open to the ideas of others.” This is a reasonable and rational position.

SCDOT has mapped out a decade-long plan designed to rebuild decayed roads and replace structurally deficient bridges all across the state.
The foundation of this mission began last Saturday, July 1, when the roads bill passed by the General Assembly became law.
The state’s gasoline tax, currently one of the lowest in the nation, is increasing for the first time since 1987. The initial increase is 2 cents a gallon, and the tax will increase by another 2 cents each year for a total of 12 cents at the end of a six-year period.

Political theater – that is all we have in Washington these days.
A number of Democrats have begun raising the possibility of removing President Trump from office for mental incapacity.
Among these members of Congress is a Georgia representative who once asked in a House hearing if the military was worried that putting too many soldiers on a Pacific island might cause it to tip over and capsize.
Another holds rallies chanting “Impeach 45,” citing no legal reason.

When it comes to spending and infrastructure, one of South Carolina’s great white whales rose from the deep with news in late June that the Army Corps of Engineers approved a permit to begin work on the South Carolina leg of Interstate 73. Ultimately, the highway could take motorists from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula straight down to Myrtle Beach.

The permit covers the whole state length, slicing across its northeastern corner, starting near Bennettsville. Construction could begin within two years, supporters say, on a project first contemplated in 1982.